Wandering in the Zero

HR Translation Service

2011-10-17T22:02:00.000-04:00

HR-speak can be difficult to understand. Take the following quote, lifted directly from a job listing for a media position in New York:

"We are only interested if you are ready for the challenge, yet have butterflies in your stomach thinking about the opportunity."

Translation:
"We want someone with the skills and experience to earn five times more than we're willing to pay."

Good luck!

Most Pretentious Ad of the Year

2011-09-23T16:25:00.000-04:00

What Stephen really needs is a nose if he wants to properly enjoy that cognac. This thing is blanketing NYC airwaves and reminding me of the fight about allowing taxpayer subsidies to support the private development of luxury condos in the first place. No discreet ad campaign for these guys, though, no sir.

Most New Yorkers are far too practical to waste money on cookie-cutter prestige built with Kleenex and spit. This is appealing to transplants with Wall St. salaries, fragile egos and an obsession with appearances. BTW, Stephen knows his wife is already sleeping with the doorman but he's cool with it because it gives him cover to go to the spa in Chelsea.

If You Call Someone an “EmoProg,” You’re an Asshole

2011-08-01T14:47:00.000-04:00

We’re all supposed to be in this together - liberals, progressives, old socialists and reformed communists, all of the same basic leftist stripe. Some know better than others that politics is a contact sport, and that compromise is the name of the game. Some know better than others that constant pressure must be kept on elected officials to get even a small portion of our agenda enacted into law. And some are simply too young or inexperienced to have a full grasp of the process.

This is where social media was supposed to be our edge. Lefties trend younger, more tech savvy and more open to legitimate debate. If you want to be a dittohead, Rush Limbaugh is always looking for more recruits. But here on the left, we understand the power of even the smallest idea from the least likely of sources. We were supposed to be the champions of crowdsourcing and on-line organizing. Instead, we’ve splintered into cliques that are increasingly more interested in personality cults than policy.

And one of the most pervasive and stupid of the cliques is the anti-“emoprog” crowd. Let’s see if we can follow the logic: criticizing President Obama is tantamount to treason, apparently, so his policies should be supported no matter what. OK, so far, given that the alternative is reactionary and less desirable in most cases. And to enforce this “my President right or wrong” approach, they have decided that there should be no dissention in the ranks. OK, I’m fading but still following. Now we enforce that mindset by creating dissention in the ranks. And I’m lost.

How does shouting epithets at fellow progressives solve anything? How does labeling a disappointed true believer an “emoprog” help? Do you think your insult is so pithy that your target can’t help but be swayed by it? Do you imagine that the subject of your invective is so easily cowed into conformity? And if so, what makes you think they’ll follow your brand of propaganda when the right wing has many more resources devoted to the same methodology? If it’s a propaganda war you want to fight, you’ll lose. Period. You don’t have the money, the resources, the network or the reach of the corporate PR machine and never will.

What you have is truth! What you lack is patience. The same patience you demand of the “emoprogs” you love to bash in your frustration is strikingly absent in your conversations with those very people. Do you think that’s lost on them? Do you think it simply doesn’t matter because you’re right and they’re wrong? Doesn’t that sound a tad… I dunno… Republican? Are those really the tactics you want to use?

While it’s true that the easily disillusioned have some political growing up to do, it’s also true that YOU’RE NOT HELPING! The “emoprogs” may need to develop more savvy and experience but YOU need to grow the fuck up. It’s the adults in the room who have the special responsibility of maintaining maturity in the face of emotion. On that score you have failed… miserably.

I don’t have to like you to agree with your politics. I have met many Democrats, in office and out, who I wouldn’t trust with my navel lint, but their hearts are in the right place. I’m not so sure about this crowd anymore, though. I see a lot of self-aggrandizement and not much by way understanding. I see more “look at me being mean in front of the popular crowd” and not much by way of “hey, I feel the same way, too, but there’s a better way.” And sure, some of those people have monetized blogs and are legitimately trying to earn a living while advancing progressive ideas, but the whole point of a progressive tide is to lift all boats, not just drive more traffic to your blog.* And if you’ve fallen into the media trap of driving traffic for the sake of traffic using whatever hyped up message works, then you're sacrificing unity for selfish reasons and that makes your “emoprog” bullshit ring even more hollow.

I find it the height of hypocrisy to cry “unity” and “emoprog” in the same sentiment. (The same goes for "Obamabot.") To claim “emoprogs” are the cause of disunity on the left while using terminology that is guaranteed to insult and make those very people feel disengaged is naive and only feeds the right wing. And when unity on the left results in legislation that could’ve been written by the Cato Institute, what’s the fucking point, anyway? If anyone has created weakness on the left in recent years, it’s YOU! You, who support everything the President does no matter what. You, who refuse to acknowledge that President Obama is more conservative than Candidate Obama. “My guy, right or wrong,” is the surest way to allow “your guy” to choose "wrong."

Kip Hampton pointed out what is obvious to any political veteran -- this mid-term was only slightly worse than most. But it’s always someone else’s fault, right? Never you. Never your methodology. Always someone else – those damn Republicans or those awful “emoprogs.” Just who the fuck do you people think you are? And I especially have no patience for flamers and hacks who hurl their vitriol from smug anonymity. I’ve had enough of your bullshit and I’m tired of trying to sort out which is the real character and which is a paid plant from the Heritage Foundation. As I said, I don’t have to like you to agree with your politics and nobody needs your permission to feel the way they do and express what they want to express. So congratulations on coining an oh-so-pithy phrase and totally missing the point AND the opportunity in the process.

Now go fuck yourselves.**

* - Yes, there are a few ads on this blog. No, I don’t spend all day trying to drive traffic to it. I post about as often as the Harvest Moon, so I’m clearly not trying to get rich here. I have better ways to earn a living.

** - I don’t expect my antagonistic tone to sway you. I expect it to offend you. Now that you’re offended, how much do you want to agree with me? See how well your strategy works? Cut out the “emoprog” crap and get back to being smart, because you ARE smart when you’re not an erupting volcano of invective. We need all hands on deck, including the "emoprogs" you disdain. The GOP has it easy -- they just follow marching orders from the CoC. Our side has it tougher because we're not a monolithic organism. So get over yourselves and get with the fucking program.

The Uninvited

2011-07-27T16:07:00.000-04:00

Jackie Robinson and Barrack Obama were not invited to their positions of public prominence. But Barack Obama is no Jackie Robinson. That much should be clear by now. The one thing they share is simply to be "first" at something. But where President Obama has seemed content with merely achieving the post, Jackie Robinson knew he had to do more.

If Jackie Robinson had been called up to the Dodgers as an act of charity, he would not have won the first ever Rookie of the Year award handed out by Major League Baseball. If his role was to simply integrate the sport and stay calm, he would not have attempted to steal home on Whitey Ford (and Yogi Berra can say whatever he likes -- Jackie was safe). He would not have stolen 29 bases in his first season or helped lead the Dodgers to the 1955 World Series victory. If Jackie Robinson had been a charity case, he would have rode the bench in stoic silence and been content to pave the way for the likes of Hank Aaron.

But Jackie Robinson was no charity case. Jackie was one of the best baseball players in the world and he showed it every time he took the field. He wasn't the fastest runner but he stole nearly every base he attempted. He wasn't a slugger but he hit game-winning home runs. He wasn't a brawler but he jawed at the umps like any other high-strung athlete on the wrong end of a close call.

The only thing Jackie did differently than any other ballplayer in his time was ignore the taunts and insults hurled at him for no other reason than the color of his skin. But in every other aspect of his athletic career, Jackie was a baseball player first and foremost. And he never apologized for being there or being better than other players. He never backed down from a challenge on the field, never allowed another man to usurp his integrity as an athlete or as a man. Jackie didn't play mean, but he knew when to slide into base spikes up to send a message.

Jackie was a professional playing on a field of professionals and while the world may not have been ready to treat him as an equal, he never acted as though he were any lesser than any of his teammates or opponents on the field. He didn't help lesser (white) ballplayers save face by stealing fewer bases or hitting fewer home runs, didn't pretend to "know his place" and act a part that was beneath him. He was hired to win ball games and he went out every day to do just that. Once the uniform was on, he was a ballplayer with a mission, like any other.

Sadly, the same cannot be said for President Obama. He has treated his presidency like a charity case. He acts as though he were allowed the presidency, rather than winning it fair and square. His policies are compromises with himself, starting from a position of weakness before the real negotiations have even begun. The right wing's obsession with his "apology tour" is more a product of his reaction to the criticism than the action itself. The conservative bullies smell his weakness and pounce on it every chance they get.

President Obama's idea of a transformational presidency is one of compromise with the uncompromising. But the leaders he has chosen to spotlight as transformational -- like Lincoln, FDR and Reagan -- were not men given to compromise. If Lincoln had been willing to compromise, it would have taken another generation or three to abolish slavery. If Roosevelt had compromised, the US would have stayed out of WWII and who knows what that outcome would have been. If Reagan had compromised, we wouldn't have 55 mile per hour speed limits all over the country and our mental hospitals would still be in service.

There have been a small handful of limited successes -- Lilly Ledbetter, DADT repeal (after an unnecessary delay), a few nice provisions in health care reform, and the consumer protection bureau, which is unlikely to get funded, or staffed, as long as the GOP has anything to say about it. But weighing down those successes is a long string of failures, as well. The constant capitulation to the minority party when he had the opportunity to save the economy has led to a lackluster recovery that will fall squarely on the President's shoulders in 2012. The GOP garroted itself on two Medicare votes and President Obama gave that political chit away by putting Medicare on the block in the debt ceiling negotiations. The debt ceiling should never have been open to debate in the first place, but Mr. Compromise keeps trying to win friends and sing around the campfire with people who quite literally want him to disappear permanently.

Not once has he or anyone working for him called out the obvious racism and unthinking bigotry. Because he doesn't get it. No matter what he does or says, the right wing will paint him in the worst possible light. And he has devoted all his energy to trying to convince those people that he really isn't all that threatening -- a mindset that is the exclusive domain of the charity case. Because he knows that progressives have nowhere else to turn but the Democratic party (don't be so sure, kids), he can "punch the hippie" to make himself look like he's part of the management class -- a mindset that is exclusive to the charity case. And all he ever manages to do is instill frustration in his natural allies while egging on the schoolyard bullies -- conservatives -- in their zeal to destroy him utterly.

No matter how many degrees and accolades he gets, there is still a virulent racism in this country that will never respect anything but strength. They won't go quietly, but they will go, eventually, IF they perceive strength in their opposition. Right now they perceive weakness -- an all-encompassing, paralyzing weakness that has served only to bring America to the brink of default for the first time in history.

Let there be no mistake: if the USA defaults, the blame will lie squarely on the shoulders of the Tea Party coalition in the GOP-led House... in reality. In politics, however, the deck is now firmly stacked against President Obama, and his chances of re-election hinge on the one thing he has carefully avoided for three years -- showing strength. President Obama needs to slide into second base spikes up and take someone out. He needs to throw a purpose pitch, brush some guys back and plant some asses in the dirt. But he isn't willing to be that guy at all, for whatever reason.

Thus, rather than the transformational presidency Barack Obama desired, his will simply be a placeholder presidency, awaiting the next Republican to drive the nation deeper into economic despair. He could have discredited 40 years of supply side economics, exposed the conservative activism on the courts and the stacking of the federal circuits and manipulation of the tax code to suit the corporate agenda, could have abolished DADT with the swipe of a pen, could have passed a two trillion dollar stimulus with not a single spending cut, and much, much more, IF he had been willing to be a ball-buster. Imagine the signal it would send if his administration chose to enforce anti-trust regulations against Walmart, for instance, or launched a justice department investigation into the cozy world of banking, hedge funds and the ratings agencies that cover up their corruption.

The howls from the right would be identical to the howls we hear now. Had the Obama administration acted like they earned their positions and deserved to enact the policies they preferred, the punditocracy would still be giving President Obama grief. But the howls would ring hollow in the face of a strong presidency actually getting things accomplished and making a positive impact on the things ordinary American care about, like jobs and the economy... stupid. But because President Obama is so fixated on his definition of transformational -- a definition that flies in the face of all American history -- he chose the camp fire route instead, and his presidency was over before it began.

Washington has been in thrall to conservative (read corporate) ideology for more than four decades now. And nothing about President Obama or his administration is going to change that. In fact, all they've done is succeed in making matters worse for progressive policy. This is GOP territory now and probably forever (thanks to the corrupt justices of the Supreme Court and their judicial activism in the form of CU vs. FEC). I've been used to it for a while. But the first-time voters that turned out for President Obama are now too disillusioned to care. The progressive wave is already over (except in Wisconsin... maybe). The Tea Party may be down to a handful of angry white people collecting social security, but the Tea Party coalition in Congress is here to stay. They have a taste of power now and nothing will stop them from doing everything they can to attain more. This will end badly for all of us. The only question is how soon?

Donald Westlake: New York City Personified

2011-07-25T22:11:00.001-04:00

Most of Donald Westlake's books were set in and around, or in some way involved, New York City. In this excerpt from a Donald Westlake interview given to La Huit (France), he describes the character New York City would be if it was personified in a detective story. I added the rest.

You can see the original unadulterated excerpt here.

The Norwegians

2011-04-27T11:47:00.001-04:00

"You have to be one unpopular world leader to have the Norwegians attacking you." ~ Richard Engel, NBC News

Raindancer

2011-04-21T21:21:00.001-04:00

Texas Governor Rick Perry has called upon the Christian faithful of his state to pray for rain. Texas has been experiencing a significant drought since October of last year. And Governor Perry's efforts could be seen as a sincere, if somewhat superstitious, approach to solving the problem. On the other hand, it could be seen as a cynical ploy to score God-points with his base while shifting the narrative away from his failed fiscal policies. I mean, if I was going to ask people to pray for rain, I'd certainly check the weather forecast first... since it's there!

So here's the five-day forecast for Dallas-Texas:

Well, looks like the Gov is in luck. Modern science, that he chooses to ignore in public, has provided him with a cheap bit of kabuki theater. This feels like a setup from Herge's classic Tintin book, "Prisoners of the Sun." Sentenced to death by living Incas, Tintin used his knowledge of a coming solar eclipse to spook the natives and save his and his companions' skin:

Or perhaps a less sophisticated version of this - post hoc, ergo propter hoc:

I tend to think that the Republican rank-and-file is actually somewhat more sophisticated than sun-worshipping Incas but obviously Rick Perry doesn't agree. And the sad truth is, he's probably right.

Luke 17:5-10

2011-03-27T19:08:00.000-04:00

Photo: Jeffrey Friedl
(5) And the apostles said to the Lord, "Increase our faith." (6) So the Lord said, "If you have faith as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, "Be pulled up by the roots and be planted in the sea," and it would obey you. (7) And which of you, having a servant plowing or tending sheep, will say to him when he has come in from the field, "Come at once and sit down to eat"? (8) But will he not rather say to him, "Prepare something for my supper, and gird yourself and serve me till I have eaten and drunk, and afterward you will eat and drink"? (9) Does he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him? I think not. (10) So likewise you, when you have done all those things which you are commanded, say, "We are unprofitable servants. We have done what was our duty to do.""

Clearly, the Lord was looking for a higher class of convert than a lowly servant. Ten percent of nothing is still nothing. The difference between Jesus and the people that wrote about Jesus is that Jesus wasn't trying to earn cash. I've never seen faith move a Mulberry tree. But I have seen a tractor do it.

The "Best and Brightest"

2011-03-21T19:18:00.006-04:00

[Update: Read Off With Their Heads at the new blog "Life After Newspapers" for reinforcement on this point.]

Keli Goff posted a good article on TheLoop21.com today and followed up with a good rant on Dylan Ratigan’s show. But there was one point that didn’t sit right with me…

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The notion that most companies retain the “best and brightest” of their workforce even during the worst of times is a myth. Multinational corporations don’t even seek the best and brightest, let alone retain them, even during the best of times. The “best and brightest” are experienced and generally older and therefore expensive and disruptive to established norms. Nearly every large corporation in America has made a common practice of replacing older, more expensive workers with younger, less experienced, more easily exploited entry-level hires. Nearly every large corporation in America has made a common practice of phasing out full time positions and replacing those functions with part time and freelance workers. Nearly every large corporation in America has a part time workforce that dwarfs the size of its full time staff. I'm sure nearly every person reading this with experience at a large corporation has seen this at work.

Now we see that many corporations are refusing to even interview unemployed people for mid-level positions that require some experience. And for some, the analysis is simple: the “best and brightest” are still working so they’re the best people to hire. That is false on both fronts. First, the best and brightest are the first to get laid off in a recession because they’re the most expensive employees. So the workforce that remains is actually less bright and less motivated by anything but cold hard cash. This is true in nearly every big company in America right now. Second, hiring an employee away from a competitor raises costs to the competitor, while acquiring a newbie or unprofessional slob leftover from the layoffs is a way to acquire insider knowledge about the competitor’s inner workings – a true professional wouldn’t kiss and tell but a newbie doesn’t know any better, often despite contractual restriction. It’s mercenary, plain and simple.

There are no studies on this phenomenon, mainly because “studies” are expensive, often require corporate funding, and no University is going to risk future endowments by funding a study that could end up confirming the worst suspicions about corporate America. The unpatriotic corporate elite have placed such a thorough stranglehold on the American economy that nobody dare criticize the structure for fear of being rendered permanently unemployed and having all earning power stripped away. This is what tyranny looks like. It may not be as obvious as Gaddafi and his thugs, but it’s a form of tyranny nonetheless. And if you think that’s hyperbole, explain why the revolutionaries in Tahrir Square in Cairo sent dozens of pizzas to the union supporters protesting in Madison, Wisconsin just a few weeks ago. The Egyptians have a much more intimate understanding of the concept of “safety in numbers” at the moment. That gesture is lost on many but huge to those of us who get it.

Glenn Beck is right to be in a panic, for once – all of these issues are connected and propagandists like him can’t afford a democratic awakening for many reasons. Since there are no studies on this subject, and there won’t be any studies on this subject, it’s up to labor to fight a public relations battle on this. As Keli pointed out, Rep. Henry Johnson (D-GA) has introduced a bill to end the practice of unemployment discrimination in the hiring process, but it’s sure to be considered dead on arrival in this dangerously waning age of the neo-con. This issue is barely scratching the surface of corporate malfeasance but it could be an Achilles Heel in the neo-con obsession with eradicating every vestige of the New Deal. Wisconsin is a leading indicator of the mood of labor across the country. The unpatriotic corporate elite will be satisfied with nothing less than permanent indentured servitude for the rest of us – if you think that’s hyperbole, do a search on “indentured servitude” or just read this.

Multinational corporations don’t like or value their employees in the slightest -- Jack Welch proved that with his factory-on-a-barge model as the utopian business model. Need more proof? Here’s an excerpt from a typical human resources website:

You’ll notice these behaviors match the “fight or flight” response you learned in school. If you recall, when an animal gets into trouble, there are just two reactions, fight or flight. As we’ve seen, your employee will react the same way when his job is threatened.

They actually believe that human employees are best understood when described as “animals.” That’s who these people are and who they’ve always been. The system didn’t make them that way. It simply gave them an avenue for their most natural psychological condition – the superiority complex.

Busting the unions is just the beginning. Eventually you will hear of companies that prohibit their employees from having any accounts on any social media sites like Twitter and Facebook at all. They will employ entire legal departments devoted to surfing the net for staffers, investigating alternate handles, sending threatening letters to networks and ISPs, luring the unsuspecting into fake organizations and then initiating mass firings. They will call it an issue of productivity but the cost of enforcement will make it clear that it’s motivated exclusively by fear of labor organizing online. These things are as predictable as they are obvious. Just follow the money and fear and watch the rest come into focus. The best and brightest are sitting at home right now, not at a desk in corporate America. And as long as we continue to allow the least among us to have the most power, that will remain the case.

The Squeeze

2010-07-12T03:43:00.005-04:00

The Squeeze pervades nearly every aspect of our lives, from the cost of grocery shopping and medical care, to the disappearance of jobs that pay a living wage, even as prices relentlessly push ever-upward (never mind deeply conflicted inflation statistics). Reactionary economists tout GDP as though the number alone has a meaningful bearing on working people’s lives. Reactionary politicos advocate shrinking government until it’s small enough to drown in a bathtub, the same ideology that presided over the fastest, most expensive, and widest-reaching expansion of the US Federal government since World War II. And when we turn to American journalism to edify us, we discover a landscape drowning in Fox News and conservative talk radio hysteria, driven by monopolistic industries using blunt instruments to cling to a bygone economy in which they could never really compete without taxpayer subsidies. The electric bill goes up. The gas bill goes up. In California, the power company just tried to codify a permanent monopoly and lost. They jack your rates anyway. The phone bill goes up. Now you have to have a cell phone to get work because you lost your full time job. Now you have to drive more to find work. In New York City, the subway system forced you to use a MetroCard instead of tokens, and now they’re angry about you using all those MetroCards so they’re going to charge you for every new one you get. Still better than Colorado Springs where they can’t afford to pick up the trash. It’s the same in cities all over America - fewer services, more delays, higher costs and an ever-more aggressive police state that sees the average American commuter or worker or student as nothing more than a common criminal, hardly deserving of basic dignity let alone respect. For far too many of these petty authoritarians, humiliation of the general public is their greatest thrill. These aren’t isolated anecdotal failures of bureaucracy or personal character flaws run amok, they are symptoms of a mostly unwritten but nevertheless omnipresent ideology that loudly and aggressively debases all things not in overt and immediate support of institutionalized power.

Income is down. Expenses are up. Nerves are frazzled. Nobody gives a crap. The banks don’t care. They want the mortgage payment, car payment, credit card-student loan-business loan payment today, now, to the penny, or you can feel free to pay 27% interest instead, if you’re lucky. The bureaucracy doesn’t care. Congress critters are way too busy covering asses closer to home to give a rat’s-behind about our sorry little world. Now, sure, a few of them seem like good eggs and maybe they are. But don’t kid yourself. It’s not their world. They have reputations to build, images to uphold, jobs to hand out to family and friends, and, most importantly, a lot of money to be made. Have you seen government pensions? Even though they’re more than most of us will ever get in retirement, they’re a mere pittance compared to the riches of shilling for corporations, writing reactionary fables, and cashing-in on the lecture circuit after leaving elected office. And our little problems are not about to spoil what is shaping up as an excellent resume for big business. It’s a selfish breed, a lying gaggle of crybabies and we all know it. They really don’t like the Obama routine. They’d like to return to simpler times – wait around for the automatic pay raise and appropriate more money for obsolete weapons systems when they get worried that people are noticing. Corporations have a stranglehold, Congress is a joke, President Obama may be trying but he isn’t looking like the Jedi Master so many of his supporters believed him to be. And too much has been placed on his shoulders anyway, given the intractability of a Congress mostly comprised of self-centered individuals. An impressive string of legislation marred by political sabotage has resulted in very little being done to rein in the big banks, the Fed, big oil, big coal, big pharma, etc.

I know my writing sounds angry and apocalyptic but if I dismissed hope, I wouldn’t be writing at all. I don’t discount the accomplishments Karoli detailed on her excellent blog, Odd Time Signatures, but an honest assessment of American society necessarily accounts for the ills we encounter with disturbing and increasing frequency in our daily lives. It’s not enough to simply complain about suffering, nor is it enough to merely advocate for better. The Declaration of Independence, our reason for being, is written with both grievances and remedies embodied in the text, which isn’t to say I fancy my writing compares, but what could be more American than following its example? If we can no longer be stirred to action by hope, then anger will suffice. I don’t want to see this world brutally raped - the environment, the people, the long-standing cultures and time-tested institutions of civilization relentlessly pounded by the sexless member of corporate greed. I don’t want to raise a family in a world where men like Rupert Murdoch, Dick Cheney and Tony Hayward can be considered titans while they trample the working class under their jack boots, where otherwise decent people can be morphed into bigoted faux-patriots with a clever punch line and a snappy brochure, and where the dominant media outlets are controlled by the very ideologies journalists should be investigating. How will Americans ever find common ground on distinguishing those policies that truly are squeezing the American Dream out of existence from undemocratic rhetoric in the guise of populism if journalism can’t be trusted?

Establishing the quagmire we currently occupy – the culmination of a long process that began generations ago – is not a repudiation of President Obama’s policies. On the contrary, I believe he hasn’t received the full support he needs for the agenda he was elected to deliver, in part, due to the lack of truth emanating from mainstream media. With every passing day, it becomes more obvious that American journalism is dying. You can say what you like about the excellent work done by a small handful of TV, radio, print, and internet journalists, and there are some, but how much impact do they make? Gen. McChrystal was fired. That’s the biggest impact we can find? Gen. McChrystal would never have been under the false impression that anything he ever said in front of a reporter was off-the-record if American journalism wasn’t dying. Network TV correspondents would not have berated Michael Hastings for daring to commit an act of journalism with his article in Rolling Stone if American journalism wasn’t dying. Glenn Beck would not be allowed to have a program on a network with “news” in the name if American journalism wasn’t dying. BP wouldn’t be getting away with half of the bullying and denials if American journalism wasn’t dying. And nobody, certainly not Ben Bernanke, would be talking about deficit reduction in the middle of a recession if American journalism wasn’t dying. It really is that simple. History and truth are the same thing only for one instant, at the time of their occurring, and never again. The truth outs eventually but when we have to wait 50 or 100 years, it ceases to be truth and becomes history. And without journalism, we can’t even agree on the lessons of history.
So what are we going to do about it?

Lots of new journalism business models have arisen in recent years in efforts to both take advantage of emerging technologies and simply stave off irrelevancy: hyper-local, crowd-funded, viewer-contributed, and more. But the problem these endeavors almost invariably face is the lack of powerful financial and legal backing that supports the kind of hard-hitting investigative reporting that really pisses off the powers-that-be. And, with rare exception, pissing off the rich kids is exactly what’s missing from American journalism today. But it is possible to build a subscriber model on cable/satellite TV that can combine the principals of economies of scale and local sourcing, to bypass the commercial, government, and donor financing models and create an outlet that is beholden only to its viewers. Journalism freed from the shackles of government censorship and commercial interference would be a fearsome cop on the beat. Bias cannot be eliminated but it can be transformed into a quest for truth. Objectivity is a myth, but transparency, coupled with checks and balances in the editorial process, and inviolable firewalls between ownership, finance, and editorial, would mimic the democratic ideal and engender trust in the viewership. It’s not just possible, if democracy is going to survive this new gilded age, it may be our only hope.

If you can contribute two minutes to the market research on this concept, please take this Subscription TV News Survey (link also at the top of the right column on this page). Thank you.

We’re All BP Now? Really?

2010-05-26T15:13:00.005-04:00

Excuse me but voters, activists and concerned citizens from the left side of the aisle have been both screaming AND trying to do something about the corporate rape of the environment for literally decades. Recycling programs, CO2 capture, protected wilderness and so on are all a direct result of the money, effort, time and, yes, loud braying of environmentalists and progressives. Not a single iota of effort on these issues has come from the right. The last Repub to give a whit about preservation, the true core of conservatism, was Teddy Roosevelt.

So, no, I do NOT accept the premise that this is everyone's fault. I do NOT accept the premise that I am guilty because I have a driver's license. I, and people of my political persuasion, did NOT destroy public transit and force American's into cars to get to work, did NOT design a system that enslaves the entire global economy to ONE SECTOR, did NOT cynically manipulate a national tragedy to annex more oil claims in the middle east. This is NOT my fault and it's NOT Obama's fault. It's the GOP's fault, straight up. It's Cato Institute's fault, straight up. It's BP's blunder, but it's the right-wing's fault. Period.

As for solutions, yeah, I got one simple incentive plan: BP violated it's contract when it failed to stage the emergency spill response equipment and personnel that was called for in the claim, therefore, they no longer have a claim and the well can legally be seized by the federal government. Create a 48-hour contest awarding BP's well to the company that can create an actionable plan that staunches the flow and cleans up 80% of the discharged oil in the Gulf within 14 days of title transfer, at no cost to taxpayers. If the Obama administration had put out that message in week two, we'd be halfway over with this tragedy by now. This isn't Obama's fault. But when people say "step in and do something," that's the kind of thing they mean.

The Locomotive of State

2010-04-29T01:53:00.005-04:00

Imagine, if you will, a steam locomotive, thundering over the flat open plains across the heartland of America. The track is straight, smooth and level. There is no real destination for this train. It has one mission, to keep going. Just keep chugging along at a reasonable speed, not too fast, not too slow, but keep chugging.

Inside this perpetually moving machine we find two engineers. They have the job of keeping the locomotive running. One job is fairly glamorous and the other about as far away from glamour as it gets. One engineer gets to drive, the glamour profession. He gets to sit in the high seat, elbow stuck out the window, cool breeze in his hair, the full power and majesty of this industrial behemoth at his fingertips. The other engineer gets to shovel coal into a hot furnace every few seconds - the not-so-glamorous job. Obviously, the glamour job is the one both engineers want but it’s not up to them to decide.

On the wall is a pair of lights controlled by their bosses. One is lit at all times. When that one goes dark, the other one lights up. Each light corresponds to one of the engineers. When the red light is on, engineer Red gets to drive. But when the blue light is on, engineer Blue gets to drive. They will both get their opportunities to drive in due course, since this is an unending journey, but neither is very happy when his light goes dark. Still, it has been the tradition in this unending, perpetually moving locomotive for the driver to abdicate his role in a gentlemanly way when his time at the controls is over. And it has worked that way, keeping the locomotive chugging at full speed, for as long as anyone can remember.

One day when engineer Red is driving, the lights switch, the red light goes dark and blue gets lit. Both engineers know what this means and Blue is pretty jazzed to get back in the saddle after a long stint with the shovel. But Red isn’t having it. Red has decided that the lights are wrong this time. He doesn’t believe Blue has a legitimate claim to the driver’s seat. Still, Red has to step aside because the bosses will know if he hasn’t gotten out of what is now Blue’s seat. But Red ain’t shoveling, no sir. Red believes it would be better if the locomotive simply stopped running than to let Blue drive. So Red sits down in a lotus position and chants quietly to himself, leaving the furnace untended and allowing the locomotive to slowly lose power and speed. Blue does all he can to keep the locomotive running, keeping an eye on the track ahead, jumping down to shovel a bit of coal into the furnace and right back up to the seat, usually in a panic, to see if he missed anything on the tracks.

And while this frantic activity unfolds around him, engineer Red sits and smirks, chanting his holy mantra to himself in smug satisfaction. You see, Red believes that engineer Blue will be reprimanded for his poor driving and yanked out of the driver’s seat sooner than rather than later. So every once in a while, when Red thinks the bosses might be looking, he yells at engineer Blue for doing such a terrible job driving such a slow train. Engineer Blue is a better driver than engineer Red but engineer Red is widely recognized as a better shoveler. The bosses that have a clear picture of the scene in the locomotive can see that. But shoveling is a skill set that lends itself to arguments that transpire in short sound bites and each little burst of info looks the same to the bosses looking in. They have no way of knowing if their fleeting glimpses into the locomotive are true depictions of real intentions or tiny political skits, microscopic one-act plays, each delivered with deliberate calculation to maximize the false impression that Red is trying to avert disaster. Only those bosses who are paying close enough attention to the trend can see the act for what it is. And many of the bosses aren't really quite sure, since they have so little time to devote to managing this train.

So here we are, engineer Blue driving-shoveling-driving-shoveling, and there sits engineer Red, smirking-yelling-smirking-yelling. The bosses are watching and, though it can be confusing, after a little while looking in at the two engineers, it just might start becoming a little too obvious that Red is simply sitting down on the job, shouting epithets and generally being a nuisance. And it gets worse, because every once in a while, when Red thinks the bosses aren’t looking, he busts out the fire extinguisher and sprays it into the furnace. Red isn’t just sitting down on the job, he has become a saboteur. But Red doesn’t realize that he’s not sabotaging engineer Blue, he’s sabotaging the locomotive. And the real risk that engineer Red is running is that the bosses will see Blue doing such a good job without Red, that they’ll decide that Blue can do it all on his own. And poor Red’s existence is entirely in the locomotive. If he gets kicked off the train, he ceases to exist. Red doesn’t fathom all this. Red is far too limited in capacity to properly appreciate the consequences of his actions. But Blue is far too busy to give Red the education he needs. And besides, Red never understands all that "engineer-speak" anyway. It’s time for the bosses to step in again. See you in November!

One Of These Things Is Not Like The Other

2010-04-16T23:20:00.003-04:00

Any person who calls another person a threat to traditional American values is, in themselves, the closest thing to a threat to traditional American values.

For the oldest and most sacred of all traditional American values is the value in challenging tradition.

The Deficit is Rising; The Sky is Falling

2010-02-02T14:11:00.008-05:00

The Chicken Little-Hawks are retreading an old reason to convince you that the sky is falling – deficit spending.

“11% of GDP is too high!” shriek the Chicken Little-Hawks. “It’ll bankrupt the country and destroy the economy!” scream the CNBC bobble-heads, who have learned as much about the economy today as they did yesterday – nada. The apoplectic reaction to the deficit is a perfect example of how little conservative Senators and TV personalities actually know about the economy and how utterly disconnected from the real economy the stock market gamblers really are.

One simple question is all that needs to be answered and every single time the Chicken Little-Hawks can’t do it. Where is the safe haven for investors if not in the United States? Let us review the options:

Europe – a collective of competing cultural identities that spends all its time searching for its own navel and is so easily spooked that a run-up in the Greek Bond market can send the FTSE reeling by 5%. The Greek Bond Market! Seriously. I think not.

Japan – Toyota just proved that American companies aren’t the only ones that grow too big, too fast and fall too hard and Apple continues to prove that Japan doesn’t have a monopoly on tech innovation. Plus, the first political transition since WWII has put a damper on the mood of the Nikkei and investors still remember the “Lost Decade.” Has potential but doesn’t really fit the definition of “Safe Haven.”

Australia/New Zealand – These more isolated economies grow much more slowly than their Western peers, are more susceptible to economic changes in Asia, and don’t have a track record of global dominance in any sector of the economy. So, a safer bet but don’t expect much more than 2% on average and good luck finding an investor who finds that alluring.

Middle East – Yeah, right.

Africa – See above.

India – A fascinating and growing economy with huge potential. Also has huge unemployment, massive social upheavals and cultural barriers to achieving truly global dominance in any industry. Like its massive neighbor to the north, India is also staring down the barrel of labor unrest in the next five to ten years that will make the Grapes of Wrath look like the grapes of Ernest and Julio Gallo.

China – Just surpassed Japan as the world’s second largest economy, is building mega-cities out of nothing at the rate of three-per-year. Has extremely favorable trading status with multiple major Western and developing markets and, despite its size, has the ability to make nimble economic adjustments as a result of the central planning that derives from authoritarian rule. Ah, there’s the rub. Authoritarian rule has also boxed China in: as mentioned above, labor pains are growing, the once-spectacular growth of Chinese GDP is slowing to more mature levels but the trouble is only getting started. Having achieved such incredible growth by pegging their currency to the US Dollar, the Chinese have artificially devalued the price of their exports. This cannot last forever and when the peg finally gets pulled, well, let’s just say the Chinese better pray for a soft landing.

South America – or more specifically, Brazil. Brazil is the first modern economy to achieve total energy independence (via a massive 30-year investment in turning sugar cane into ethanol). Rio is getting the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup drops in next after the festivities in South Africa. Seems poised to become the South American lion that roared across the global landscape. Couple snags. The country is run by a populist leftist (Lula) who is more interested in increasing quality of life than he is in increasing stock prices or interest rates. And it’s still South America, which can be a rough neighborhood, what with FARC rebels fighting American commandos in the mountains of Columbia and Hugo Chavez shouting epithets at everyone in hearing from his palace in Caracas, to the delight of his followers. Brazil has much going for it but the rewards come with some big risks.

So, where can I go with my money that gives me the potential growth I’m looking for while mitigating some of the messy risk attendant with unclean humanity? Hmmm?

United States – Still suffering its worst recession since the 1930s. An ancient, coal and oil-based economy with a crumbling infrastructure and unemployment exceeded only by under-employment. An almost non-existent manufacturing base and antiquated energy and communications networks that make French high school students look like astronauts. French high school students! And yet, still the largest economy in the world, larger and with more global reach than any economy the world has ever seen. Still the most productive workforce on the planet, almost twice as productive as the Japanese and Germans, more than three times more productive than the Chinese, even with their $1-a-week wages. Originator of nearly as many patents and copyrights as the rest of the world combined! The seat of the United Nations, the most traded stock exchanges on Earth and all this backed up by the most powerful military any world leader has ever been forced to ponder. And the largest reserves of gold ever accumulated in one place in history means we’ve even hedged against ourselves, so in the unlikely event that we actually do manage to wipe ourselves out and completely obliterate the economy, our gold reserves will become the most valuable commodity on Earth and allow us to quickly rebuild and leap to the front of the pack once again. What could be a safer bet than that?

So, to the Chicken Little-Hawks, if you think you've found another place that boasts anything approaching that kind of risk/reward ratio, I encourage you to put all your money there. Just remember, it was you guys that forced Clinton to “reform” welfare. No free lunch!

The Amplifier vs. The Flow

2009-12-23T13:40:00.010-05:00

New Media’s Challenge to Traditional Broadcasting

The history of traditional media is the story of homogenization. From the moment Gutenberg made his first print run of identical, mechanically reproduced Bibles, the world has witnessed a consolidation of ideas, histories, cultural identities, academic and technological progress and just about every concept that can be communicated through language or symbols. We think of the invention of the telescope as one continuous process that frequently is credited to Galileo, whereas, in fact, the first telescopes preceded Galileo and were developed independently by several inventors. We think of Republican Democracy as being a uniquely American invention and while most people recognize that America’s Founders culled many ideas from the Greek Republic and British Parliamentary tradition, few realize just how much of the U.S. Constitution is owed to the Iroquois Federation of Native American tribes, including the concept of Federalism itself. Because, for large swaths of the population, whatever we learned in school was long submerged by the narrative of broadcast media, and one of the long-accepted truths of that narrative, though it has lacked some resonance in recent years, is a near total dismissal of all contributions made by Native Americans.

The world in which we live is too broad and fluid, too dynamic to fit neatly into the pipeline of a traditional broadcast channel. One channel, one conduit, cannot encompass the entire world of communicable ideas. Choices inevitably must be made and those choices made by each broadcaster constitute what Raymond Williams described as the “flow” of that channel, the continuous stream of images and sounds that are assembled in ways that maximize the potential to acquire and maintain as large an audience as possible. The limitations of the single conduit, combined with the limitations imposed by the clock and the necessity of setting aside broadcast time for advertising, forces another series of choices to create efficiencies in the broadcast. Shortening the amount of time each element requires before the next element can begin, from weather forecasts to show credits, stretches the clock and allows for more programming, more advertising and more revenue.

The side effect of this broadcasting short-form suffused in the context of a continuous flow, is the development of an unwritten narrative that presumes an understanding by all participants. From the fake smile of the news anchor and the animated melodrama of kids shows to the gladiator spectacle of major sports and the manufactured hyper-reality of “Reality TV,” we, the audience, are expected to assimilate the images and sounds, the flow, as a natural part of the narrative that surrounds us. But the narrative that surrounds us in our daily lives is a remote and distant cousin of the narrative we see in broadcast channels. The narrative of our origins, our families, our national pride and our personal goals is always unique and individual. We’re all full of nuance, uncertainty and prideful misconceptions. We expect the unexpected in our daily activities because that’s life. But that’s not broadcasting.

Broadcasting shuns the unexpected. In the simplest and most wholesome of American expressions, “Happy Thanksgiving,” is a world of pain and torment for millions of Native Americans. But the majority of non-native Americans believe Thanksgiving is as wholesome as holidays get. Is that an argument for the six o’clock news? Is it wrong for broadcasters to stay out of the fray and simply say “Happy Thanksgiving” or should they communicate the controversy? Do we re-hash the Thanksgiving issue every year? Will people tune in if they know they’ll be made to feel guilty about the deaths of Native Americans hundreds of years ago? Or is it easier to fall back on the accepted narrative and ignore Native Americans altogether? Broadcasters aren’t willing to take those risks… not any more.

November 1960, the day after Thanksgiving. Perhaps the most influential news report ever broadcast on America’s airwaves stuns the nation as CBS Reports host Edward R. Murrow, reporter David Lowe and Executive Producer Fred Friendly relate the plight of America’s migrant farm workers in a news report called Harvest of Shame.

Murrow: This is the way the humans who harvest the food for the best-fed people in the world get hired. One farmer looked at this and said,
"We used to own our slaves; now we just rent them."

In 1960, there were only three national broadcast networks (ABC, CBS and NBC) and a small handful of independent stations and no public broadcasters (PBS and NPR were established with the passage of the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967). According to Cobbett Steinberg in the book TV Facts (Facts on File, 1986), by 1960, almost 50 million TV sets had been sold in America. With fewer than half a dozen broadcasters dividing the audience pie in any market, the average audience size was ten times the average for today’s broadcasters. In addition, Gunsmoke, on CBS, was the highest rated show on TV for the fourth year running in 1960, with an average of 17.6 million viewers. If a third of the audience dropped after Gunsmoke, it would still mean at least 10 million people tuned into the Harvest of Shame broadcast. The Census Bureau puts the population of the United States at roughly 180 million in 1960, which means that almost 10% of the nation watched Gunsmoke and more than 5% of the nation watched Harvest of Shame. Word of mouth is the most effective means of persuasive communication but starting with 10 million voices is a tsunami.

In 1961, the US Congress amended the Fair Labor and Standards Act (FLSA, 1938) to include farm workers in the minimum wage provision. Though it wasn’t until 1967 that real farm labor reform found it’s way into the FLSA, there is no question that the passage of the amending acts would never have occurred had it not been for CBS Reports’ broadcast on the day after Thanksgiving 1960. Despite the massive national guilt trip, only the self-serving accused CBS of manipulating the national mood. Most people understood the shock value. Many applauded the effort and some even wrote to their representatives.

That a single broadcast could spark a national conversation is a prime example of the dominance of the broadcasting flow. Several thousands or maybe hundreds of thousands of people knew and openly discussed the issue of exploited farm labor in America. But it wasn’t until Murrow took it on that it became a dominant issue in American political life. Yet it is also an example of an interruption in that flow. While the audience had come to expect hard-hitting, fact-heavy reporting from Murrow and Friendly, who had courageously reported on Senator Joe McCarthy’s abuse of power during the HUAC hearings, nobody anticipated the kind of shock, aimed straight at the heart of the viewer, that came with Harvest of Shame. And while it serves as among the best examples of media’s power to make a direct and positive impact on society, it also marks the beginning of the end of that high level of journalistic freedom on the airwaves.

The one thing moneyed interests can be counted on to do is protect their interests. As the primary financiers of broadcast outlets, sponsors were not about to run the risk of public outrage if any of their unseemly business practices were to see the light of day. And while the tradition of hard-nosed investigative reporting on the nefarious activities of persons in power continued, most notably in the form of CBS’ 60 Minutes, behind the scenes, corporate power was consolidating its grip on traditional media. Even as the number and variety of broadcasters has continued to expand right up to this day, larger and more powerful media conglomerates have also emerged, consolidating ownership, acquiring independent outlets and taking control of an ever-larger percentage of the media landscape, in both television and radio. Even as the competition for audience share has heated up, the audience has been more and more often unwittingly choosing between “competitors” with the same parent (particularly in radio markets).

Traditional commercial broadcasting is a for-profit business, first and foremost. Every second counts and every decision that erodes revenue is the wrong decision. Revenue comes from sponsors and sponsors are concerned with one or both of two key aspects in a broadcast outlet: audience share (total and key demographics) and ideology. There’s only one way to gain or lose audience share: programming. With rare exception, the audience doesn’t care about the sponsors, just the programming. Whereas, sponsors who obviously want to reach the largest possible audience with their advertising dollars, may also want to associate their brands with particular types of programming that either enhances or, at the very least, doesn’t damage their brands’ reputation. Some have even managed to directly influence the narrative and editorial content of programming to suit the image of the sponsor or propagate a business agenda.

A current example of this has been widely reported by multiple media sources: Glenn Beck’s gold sponsors. The Fox News Channel’s Glenn Beck, host of his own primetime hour-long show on politics and current events, is well-known for his reactionary stance on political issues. As part of this persona, he has been particularly vociferous about his fear that our newly elected President and his political party are going to “destroy America,” particularly the American economy. Several of his sponsors are purveyors of gold. It is well known that the value of gold rises in times of fear and uncertainty. If Glenn Beck’s audience is anything like the man himself, many must be in a perpetual state of fear and anxiety and a perfect target for gold salesmen. All it takes is basic business acumen to make that connection and start pumping the ad dollars. But then we found out that Beck is a paid spokesman for one of his sponsors, Goldline. And then an executive at another of those sponsors, Peter Epstein, President of Merit Financial Services, which advertises on Fox during Beck’s show, told Ken Vogel of Politico.com, “You pay anybody on any network and they say what you pay them to say. They’re bought and sold.”

While this moment represents one of many thousands of cuts instead of the one big slice that Harvest of Shame represented, it is indicative of the battle taking place between the multi-directional, heterogeneous currents of new media and the dominant homogenous media flow of decades past. The unease over Beck’s apparent conflict of interest with his gold sponsors began with liberal blog posts. Soon, a number of more traditional outlets were doing some reporting on the story. The Los Angeles Times broke the news about Beck’s payments from Goldline. It came back to the web via Politico.com’s interview with Epstein and then reverberated throughout the media landscape again when Keith Olbermann chose to make Beck the runner-up “Worst Person in the World” in his nightly broadcast, based on Politco’s reporting. Within days, Beck had to defend himself on his radio show and again later on his Fox program.

But that’s not the end of the story by any means. This is where audience agency enters the picture. And this is where “The Amplifier” gets the name. Despite the obvious conflict of interest and the fact that Beck played his own loyal audience for fools, very few are likely to have their opinion altered by the scandal. In fact, history suggests that it’s more likely that most of his loyal followers will perceive any “scandal” as a liberal media backlash against a man they believe speaks truth to power. And new media provides a platform for that point of view to be expressed, shared and agreed upon by like-minded people and amplified back to traditional media as a backlash to their reporting.

Americans don’t like being played for fools and are more likely to interpret an egregious break from perceived character (a la Beck) as anecdotally insignificant as opposed to indicative of an actual character flaw. And in a culture where we are expected to choose sides on a daily, almost ritualistic basis, most American’s feel a personal connection to the issues that dominate and the personalities that populate traditional media. And like all members of a clan or tribe, we become members of the cliques that support X, love Y or can’t stand to listen to Z. And whenever a member of that clique is threatened, right or wrong, we tend to circle the wagons and protect our own. Only now, we can extend our idea of what deserves protecting, amplifying outward for the entire world to see and judge and amplify back to us. And the more we customize and narrow our consumption of media to the interests and opinions we share, the more we’re really just speaking to ourselves in an echo chamber of non-stop amplification feedback. In this confined space of reverberating and amplifying ideology, what room is there for the alternative viewpoint, let alone the old narrative?

Traditional media is accustomed to being in control not just of its own message, but in large part, of the national dialogue. Just like the proverb about a tree falling in the forest, if a million people protest on the Washington Mall and no TV cameras are there to cover it, it never really happened. That was true as recently as last decade. It’s not true any more. Fox News has consistently overestimated the crowd size at conservative “Tea Party” protests since April 2009. Since Fox is often the only national TV network to cover the rally, new media sites have been instrumental in providing the content to other traditional outlets that proves the estimates to be wrong. The DailyKOS video page still has clips of MSNBC’s Olbermann taking Fox hosts to task on the issue, using video originally obtained by DailyKOS. Dan Rather used a re-constructed document in a sensitive investigative report and conservatives used the internet to expose the truth and agitate for his ouster and he was subsequently fired. Dan Rather replaced Walter Cronkite, “the most trusted man in America” and traditional media’s icon, and he was ruined by forces using new media to attack the traditional fortress from the flank.

As I type on a soggy Sunday morning in Brooklyn, NY, The Amplifier is hard at work. Traditional broadcast personalities are tweeting the run-downs for their Sunday talk shows. The tweets are being re-tweeted by their fans and detractors alike, each adding two cents of praise or condemnation as they pass it down the line to the next re-tweeter. By the end of the day, the same message will have been sent around the world hundreds or thousands of times even as the event it announced will have long since passed. Yet most of the re-tweeters will not watch the program announced in the original tweet. They don’t feel they need to actually watch the primary source themselves because The Amplifier will tell them what happened. The Amplifier will parse the offending or exalting tidbit out of its original context and amplify the insult or praise within the chosen context of the narrative of the clique, from obvious narratives like “all liberals/conservatives are good/bad” to eccentric narratives like conspiracy cliques who believe everything in the media is a cover up, including this essay.

As almost exactly described by Henry Jenkins in his essay on Pop Cosmopolitanism (Fans, Bloggers and Gamers, NYU Press 2006), but with somewhat less of Jenkins’ optimism, the cliques we trust are out there, always at work, watching everything and forming opinions we can grab whenever we need. The Amplifier enables us to feel confident in our views because it provides endless opportunities to reinforce those views within the context of our chosen ideologies. We can stay within the sphere of our chosen cliques and never venture into uncertain terrain and in that manner, amplify our perception of our own contributions to the ongoing dialogue. Each clique can feel as though it’s the “in-crowd,” the popular clique, the smart kids because whoever might challenge them is living inside their own feedback loop, believing in their own infallibility and amplifying it within the echo chambers of their cliques of choice.
If all you care about is detective novels, you never have to be confronted with an English major telling you it’s not really literature. If Japanese anime is the only thing you care about, you never have to listen to a Disney lover talk about production values. If you’re a Democrat, you never have to tolerate a Republican and vice versa. You can stay within your clique, amplify the opinions of your cohorts and have your opinions amplified back to you and never challenge yourself to venture outside of the echo chamber. It is absolutely the antithesis to the homogenization of traditional broadcasting. Where traditional media connected dots, even manipulated the connecting of dots to create a specific narrative, new media leaves the dots unconnected and unmolested, enabling the dots to grow in size. The end result is less a mosaic of inter-connected society, and more a multi-layered Venn diagram of isolated special interests that rarely overlap.

But lest we neglect audience agency, it should be noted that there are plenty of people who skip from dot to dot in the Venn diagram of new media. The kool-aid is not being poured into every cup. While it is enough for some to enjoy The Amplifier for what it is, there are others who are trying to create a real civic platform within the structure of new media. Consumer review websites allow people to describe their experiences with consumer products, creating a real-time environment for determining the value of an anticipated purchase. Most political websites, like DailyKOS and WorldNetDaily, can be extremely partisan in nature, intentionally and unintentionally. But there are a few places where real political dialogue can be engaged and debated without childishness. There are some very serious debates between readers in the book reviews on Amazon.com, debates that would find a home in any college classroom. And with C-Span.org and a host of government watchdog sites, we can verify the facts surrounding any piece of legislation faster and more reliably than at any time in history.

The Flow of traditional media is a long way from succumbing to The Amplifier of new media but the challenge is being felt now more than ever. The novelty of new media has yet wear off. But it will and as it does, the volume will almost certainly start to come down. Some college genius will develop a tool that starts to erase the cliques, or combines the cliques in new and eye-opening ways. And people will find new and innovative ways to connect with each other if only to further their own interests at the very least. And as new media matures and develops a stronger voice of credibility with the general public, combined with its ability to propagate even the smallest of concepts, traditional media will find its narrative challenged more and more until it finally breaks down and follows the new leader, which will be new media. Until then, however, we can expect new media to do what it does best – Amplify.

References:

Aaraujo. (2009). Glenn beck's gold-gate. Message posted to http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/12/9/13593/3154

Bozell, B. (2004). Dan rather in crisis. Message posted to http://www.mediaresearch.org/campaign/04/rather.asp

Canright, S. (2009 (Updated), NASA education: Telescope history. Message posted to http://www.nasa.gov/audience/forstudents/9-12/features/telescope_feature_912.html

Casconi, C. (2008). The classic TV database. Message posted to http://classic-tv.com/1960-1961TVShowRatings.html

Cockwell, G. (Producer), & Olbermann, K. (Producer). (2009). Countdown with Keith Olbermann. [Video/DVD] MSNBC. Retrieved from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/3036677/ns/msnbc_tv-countdown_with_keith_olbermann/#34354504

Cockwell, G. (Producer), & Olbermann, K. (Producer). (2009). Keith O. Pounds Fox's Cavuto. [Video/DVD] Retrieved from http://www.dailykostv.com/w/001171/

Cook, B. (2000). Iroquois confederacy and the Influence Thesis. Unpublished M.Ed., Plymouth State University,

Einstein, M. (2004). Media Diversity: Economics, Ownership and the FCC Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Fuller, V., & Mason, B. (1977). Farm labor. Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 429(63)

Jenkins, H. (2006). Fans, bloggers and gamers: Exploring participatory culture. New York: New York University Press.

Friendly, F. (Producer), & Murrow, E. R. (Producer). (1960). Harvest of Shame. [Video/DVD] CBS.

Rainey, J. (2009). Glenn Beck's flawed gold standard. Message posted to http://www.latimes.com/business/la-et-onthemedia9-2009dec09,0,3157254.column

Sperber, A. (1986). Murrow, his life and times. New York: Freudlich Books.

Steinberg, C. (1980). TV facts (Revised ed.) Facts on File.

Van Helden, A. (1995). The Galileo Project: The Telescope. Message posted to http://galileo.rice.edu/sci/instruments/telescope.html

Vogel, K. (2009). Right-wing talkers go for the gold. Message posted to http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1209/30231.html

Williams, R. (1975). Television: Technology and cultural form Schocken Books.

Witt, R. (2009). Glenn beck continues to claim innocence... Message posted to http://www.examiner.com/x-5738-Political-Buzz-Examiner~y2009m12d3-Video--Glenn-Beck-continues-to-claim-innocence-on-his-goldbuying-tactics

The Linchpin of Democracy

2009-11-27T22:56:00.004-05:00

"Knowledge is power."
- Francis Bacon

"The pen is mightier than the sword."
- Edward Bulwer-Lytton

"The truth shall make you free"
- John 8:32

Nowhere are these aphorisms more relevant than in the functioning of a legitimate, healthy democracy. And nowhere has the struggle to control both access to and dissemination of information been more dynamic and changeable than in modern democratic societies. Totalitarian States have the luxury of executive fiat to control access to, and the shape of, information. Social-tribal cultures, still adhering to a primarily oral tradition of communication, have very little to hide since they have few hiding places – if you want information, you have to speak and spoken communication is easily overheard and quickly disseminated, resulting in few secrets remaining secret for very long. (These cultures do still exist, from the tiny Himalayan Kingdom of Bhutan to the car-less stretches of Long Island’s barrier beaches in New York State – anyone from “small-town-America” knows how hard it is to keep a secret from their neighbors.) The decisive factor is the level of corruption within any given society.

Totalitarian societies are almost totally corrupt – all information is controlled, filtered and disseminated only in ways that enhance the power of the ruling class. Social-tribal societies are almost totally incorruptible due to the communal nature of nearly all activities and the shared risk-reward system that binds their citizens to one another. Floating somewhere between these two extremes is the modern democratic society.

Obviously, the complexity of modern democracies renders any meaningful comparison to social-tribal cultures vague, but it is sufficient to recognize that occupational specialization in modern culture necessitates the compartmentalizing of information, destroying the shared risk-reward of the entire tribe and replacing it with competing groups (and individuals) that define risk-reward in increasingly narrow terms. Not all competitors are “good” or “bad” but most have come to be known (at least in the United States) as “special interests.”

By contrast, totalitarian societies maintain the illusion of social-tribal risk-reward by shaping and disseminating information that is crafted to maximize the indoctrination of specialized groups to the priorities of the ruling elite. The risk-reward of the entire tribe is transposed to the risk-reward of “the State.” Social inequities that almost invariably emerge as a result of specialization are suppressed, often through violence and imprisonment and the resulting intimidation, to the degree that the risk of dissent appears to outweigh the reward. Through constant conditioning of this type, the priorities of the proletariat gradually shift from shared risk-reward to self-preservation, ironically, through the suppression of the individual, public “self.” The absence of independent sources of information creates a static society – one that make progress, whether social, technical or academic, only in proportion to the vision, intelligence and planning of the ruling class, which is too small a pool of resources to compete with modern cultures that do not limit the levers of power to a select few.

The advantage enjoyed by modern democracies is rooted in decentralization: of the conduits of communication; of education; of technical innovation; of political power; in short, of almost all the pursuits and disciplines of a specialized populace. Decentralization creates a larger “seed pool” of ideas and innovation, resulting in a more dynamic debate between competing interests. The ideal result is an honest competition of ideas that produces the “best” answer, as opposed to the answer that, as the writer George Saunders so eloquently described in his essay The Braindead Megaphone, serves the loudest or most powerful interests. However, these competing groups become dependent upon the reliability and credibility of the information they receive in order to make informed decisions that advance and balance their individual, civic and patriotic interests. A credible and reliable, and decentralized, journalism industry is the essential ingredient in this dynamic of the modern democracy.

Journalism has never been an easily defined term and it gets increasingly difficult with the rise and rapid spread of inexpensive technology that places new conduits of dissemination in the hands of an ever-larger number of people from an ever-larger cross-section of modern society. Merriam-Webster has several definitions but the most pertinent to this discussion is as follows:

“2. Writing characterized by a direct presentation of facts or description of events without an attempt at interpretation.”

Put more simply, journalism is the practice of seeking, chronicling and disseminating truth… in theory, at least. In practice, truth takes many forms. Sportscasters find and report truth. Fashion reporters and celebrity magazines find and report truth. Meteorologists make every effort to forecast truth, with mixed results. And many of the truths reported in stories like these (typically not considered to be in the realm of “hard” journalism) are relevant and important to many of the special interests in modern society. But these kinds of “fluff” stories, while true, are rarely relevant in the context of the one entity that is the mother of all special interests – government.

Whether properly attributed to Edmund Burke or Thomas Macaulay, the term “Fourth Estate” was coined in the early 19th century and is meant in reference to the concept of the Estates of the Realm. Dating from the era of Feudalism, the first three Estates represent the nobility (often first, sometimes second), the clergy (often second, sometimes first) and commoners (always third). With the proliferation of print technology and the rise of journalism as an occupation, the Fourth Estate was seen as properly counterbalancing the power of the first two Estates for the benefit of the less powerful but numerically superior Third Estate (we the people).

The Braindead Megaphone effect, while brilliantly applied to the current state of American journalism, is actually nothing new. The history of Feudal states is rife with the tragic consequences of whole societies following the dictates of misguided, even recognizably insane, nobility (Henry VIII, Louis XVI) and clergy (Crusades, Spanish Inquisition). When defying the monarch (or the Pope) could bring an instant death sentence, even the most superior intellect is no match for the power of the dictate. In such circumstances, the Braindead Megaphone effect is, well, in effect. When Burke and Macaulay (both members of the British House of Commons) recognized the emerging power of the commoners, journalism was elevated to its own status as an “Estate” in their eyes because the populace relied on the press to make decisions about who to elect to the House of Commons. Quite suddenly, the press was able to make or break a political career, enough to change the complexion of Parliament and, thereby, creating the opportunity to affect policy in ways that no modern government had ever encountered before.

So the existence of journalism, seen in the light of its relationship to the first three Estates, is much more than mere truth, mere storytelling, mere fact-finding or forecasting. Journalism is the key ingredient in decision-making in a democracy. It is the glue that binds the government, the people and the institutions that keep our society safe and prosperous. It is the engine of discovery and progress on a national, even global, scale.

Today, journalism is in flux. The business models are breaking down. Expensive, hard-hitting investigative reporting, that most clearly reflects journalism’s status as the Fourth Estate, is less profitable than reporting on the latest celebrity scandal. The rapid consolidation of media outlets, the total abandonment of the Fairness Doctrine and the pressures of operating a profitable enterprise have created a kind of reporting that is more properly categorized as entertainment. And wild exaggerations and partisan rhetoric (from all directions) is now repeated so often, reinforced with the aid of an explosion of Internet sites devoted to narrow interests, that deciphering truth from fiction is becoming a significant challenge to all observers, including the world’s best, most dedicated journalists.

But it’s not all bad news. The rise of the Internet is creating new business models that create new opportunities to “democratize” journalism in ways that it has never been forced to confront in the past. The spread of less and less expensive technologies, from video cameras to satellite phones, opens the door to “citizen journalists.” People who happen to be in the right place at the right time with the right technology at their disposal have already made an impact on the landscape of both journalism and society as a whole, from the death of a young girl in Iran (Neda) to the abuse of authority of campus security guards (“Don’t tase me, bro!”). Al Gore’s venture with CurrentTV is a melding of “infotainment” and citizen journalism that has, so far, taken some root among a younger audience that traditionally eschews the news as boring and irrelevant.

Michael Rosenblum, instrumental in the creation of cable television channels from NY1 to Oxygen, has described this democratization of journalism as a necessary process for the industry and perhaps he’s right. Perhaps journalism has been enjoying the status as the Fourth Estate without really living up to that responsibility, at least in recent memory. It is the job of the citizen of a democratic state to stay informed if that citizen is to be a constructive member of the voting public. But perhaps journalism has placed too much of the onus on the citizenry to distinguish between that which is edifying versus that which is merely entertaining. And while it may be more profitable to rank the day’s stories based on popular appeal, media outlets may also have the responsibility of ranking the events of the day on a scale of relevance to the body politic. How such a scale would be structured and who would be allowed to make such decisions is a question that already has an answer in modern democracies – decentralization. As long as a multitude of media outlets exist and remain competitive with each other, the citizenry will continue to have many options for discovering truth. But is that enough?

As of this writing, the biggest ongoing debate in Washington D.C. is on health care reform. One of the most contentious components of the debate revolves around the concept of a government-run, public health insurance option that would force health insurers to be more competitive, with the goal of driving down costs over time. Journalism already has a public option – National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting Service. But they are both severely under-funded. And yet, while PBS is largely ignored, NPR has an average of 7.6 million daily listeners, which reflects the fact, in part, that matching production values with commercial outlets is easier to do on radio than on TV. Still, NPR's Morning Edition draws nearly the same size audience as ABC's Good Morning America and NBC's Today show combined. Clearly, there is a large demand for journalism that does more than just repeat the banalities of weekend box office receipts and holiday travel snafus. It is conceivable that an injection of resources, coupled with a mandate to edify the citizenry on controversial subjects of timely import, would enable NPR and PBS to compete with privatized, entertainment-heavy media outlets in a way that would reverse the trend and drive up the level of debate in American political and civic discourse.

The value of an informed citizenry cannot be overstated and we are rapidly approaching a crossroads for journalism as newspaper after newspaper shuts down the presses for good and broadcast news devotes less and less time to actual news of any civic relevance. The question that cannot yet be answered… will journalism survive the information age? All people with a vested interest in democracy should hope so.